Be it at the start, in the middle, or chasing the end of the season, we all reach a point as solo queue players where we question our methods and how we might go about upping our game to reach our ranked goals. So, today I’m going to be breaking down some strategies and mindsets to climbing the ranked ladder that anyone can utilize to see immediate impact on their position. Without any further ado, here are the best Solo Queue Climbing Methods.


1). Meta-Maining, Comfort Picking, and One-Tricking

Though each of these could be broken up into their own separate categories, I feel they all deserve to be discussed alongside one another. Each of these styles is going to deal directly with the constant changes that Riot applies to the game, and depending on a given patch, you may switch yourself between one or the other in an effort to better improve your LP gains. So, with that said, let’s define each for the potentially unfamiliar.

Meta-Maining is where you play what is consider ‘meta’ or optimal to play during a given patch. What is and isn’t meta is dictated by a few factors, but often it boils down to professional/high elo presence, winrate, and playrate.

Comfort Picking is simply selecting a Champion you are deeply familiar with regardless of winrate, playrate, or professional presence.

One-Tricking is defined by taking a single Champion, and playing them across all roles and situations regardless of viability.

So, now you’re asking, which of these modes is best? Well, that’s for you to decide for yourself because depending on who you ask, you’ll find a multitude of answers. But I will break down the positives and negatives for each style and hopefully you can find yourself a mode that best suits you.

Meta-Maining, as mentioned, focuses on playing what is optimal in the given state of solo queue. And what is optimal changes with each balance patch. So, in this mode of thought, you’ll find yourself adjusting your pool patch-to-patch depending on your role and you’ll be looking to strike the most optimal Champion each game.

When something is considered ‘meta’ it is capable of performing in its role in a dominating and unique fashion in comparison to the rest of the Champions that can play in the lane. And often, Meta picks are so inherently strong, the Champion itself can sometimes compensate for the weaknesses of the player.

But, that isn’t to say that whenever a Champion is considered Meta they are a free win or extremely easy to play and understand. Items, adjustments to other roles, and statistical fluctuations can swing, and constantly keeping up on what is meta brings about unfamiliarity, which is one of the key downsides to Meta-Maining. You might have a decent winrate and KDA on Diana because she’s particularly strong on a given patch, but the guy that’s put 500 hours into Galio for years is going to have an innate knowledge of your matchup having seen it through good and bad phases of his Champion. And though your pick might be ‘meta’, his deep familiarity may lead him to see windows of opportunity that you’d never see when switching up your top picks each patch.

Comfort Picking as mentioned above brings the positive of familiarity and experience. Deep experience on a Champion will allow you to not only learn their matchups but will also allow you to adjust your macro (map-wide) goals to help your team.

Comfort Picking also makes one very familiar with a style or class of play. Meaning that you’ll have bleed over into other picks should you decide to branch out. So, as a Fizz main, you may end up finding yourself drawn to picks like Talon or Zed which provide what Fizz does in the form of Assassin related burst and roam, but in a different fashion thanks to his AD scalings. Or if you’re a Lux main, Morgana might be a great backup choice for you to manage an AP push and pick style Champion.

The downside to comfort picking comes when the comfort pick isn’t meta, or in some cases is considered an off-meta pick. If a Champion has received nerfs or isn’t a strong pick due to the current meta style, selecting a Champion you consider comfort may end up making yourself a liability. For example, Mid Lane is focused on aggression and roaming on a given patch, a scaling pick like Ryze or Zilean might not be the best choice even if you’re rocking a deep history with those Champions.

One-Tricking takes the comfort aspect and focuses it down solely on one Champion. The positives of this method is that you, over time, will learn every matchup in the game, you’ll innately understand the power-spikes and weaknesses of your Champion, and your muscle memory macro knowledge when utilizing your select Champion will be through the roof. And often, this method is considered the ‘best’ method if you want immediate LP gains, especially if you decide to one-trick a strong meta choice.

However, One-Tricking removes any and all adaptability from your Draft and even during rough patches for your Champion, you sometimes force the issue simply to play your chosen pick. And this can lead to some volatile lobbies depending on the mental of your teammates.

My personal recommendation is to have a mix of comfort and meta. Often, you’ll find a main that bleeds into the meta selection and I start with the Champion to create a small rotation of picks that I flow from depending on how draft plays out.

For example, this season I’ve started with Bard. With Bard’s selection, I’ve picked up his arguably roughest matchup, Blitzcrank, who can abuse Bard’s desire to roam and influence the rest of the map while also just threatening him constantly in lane. Both are super strong solo queue meta picks right now, but if one or both of these picks are off the board, then I fall back on my tried and true Morgana pick which brings a little bit of what both Blitz and Bard provide to a team, while being a Champion I have a deep history with.

If all these picks are off the board or the matchups are horrible, I exercise my second strategy in climbing, Effective Dodging.

2. Dodging, ELO, and MMR.

Dodging isn’t just something you need to do when you see a Blitzhook coming, it’s something you need to utilize and consider in each and every draft. For those unaware, there are two ranked systems that get utilized to manage League’s ladder. One hidden and one not.

The not hidden system is the one that we’re all familiar with and have coined the ELO System. This system is represented by the ranks from Iron to Challenger and is a great visual representation of where your skill is at.

However, the hidden MMR system is the true judiciary of one’s skill and controls who you are matched with from game to game while also affecting the amount of LP you gain or lose from each victory or loss. It’s this rating that we want to put emphasis on and the way we protect, or in some cases abuse, this rating is by effectively dodging.

You see, when you dodge a lobby, you suffer only in the form of an LP loss plus dodge timer. This is done so you’re encouraged not to dodge every lobby and cause queues to suffer. However, when you dodge, despite the LP loss, your MMR rating does not suffer. So, how do we use this information?

Well, when you encounter a volatile lobby. One with players threatening to troll, toxicity in the chat, or even when the team comp is extremely unfavorable for you, you simply hit the X button and dodge. You take the lump from Riot’s system, but you’ve preserved your MMR rating. Whereas, if you took that bad lobby and hoped for the best but ended up ultimately losing, not only would you lose more than the LP penalty for dodging, you’d be out that time and energy, AND your MMR rating would lightly fluctuate which could cause your LP gains to alter going forward. Make the call to stick to a couple of bad lobbies in a row, and you’ve got yourself a crusin’ for a brusin’ when it comes to matchmaking and you’re likely going to struggle to maintain a rank, let alone climb. Trust me, players have given up on their accounts entirely just due to poor MMR.

So, we beat the trolls and the system by dodging effectively and working our way to solid team comps and mental so that our time and energy can be utilized effectively.


3. Session Length

From time in coaching, the core aspect of improvement and climbing that I always preached to my players was finding an appropriate session length. Meaning, it’s up to you to boil down how strong your mental and physical game is, so that you can effectively allot yourself time to climb in a purely productive mindset. But, I always started with this simple system to help those implement a system for themselves when they lacked one. And it’s a simple Set / Best Of style of play.

My system works like this:

1. I sit down with the mindset to play an extremely focused set of games, and I start with a Best of Three set.

2. Between each game, I take a five to ten minute break to refresh or review.

3. If I win my set, I either increase the set count (from three to five) or I repeat the set itself. I do this, until I drop a set or until my mental has been exhausted. And I always play in the mind of staying above .500 for the day overall.

4. If I drop a set, regardless of if its my first of the day, I always take an extended break. Be this an hour or two, I play either other games or normals to readjust myself before diving back in. I cannot stress enough, if you are playing while on a heavy losing streak, you are simply asking for losses to be delivered to you. Even in situations where I feel my mental is fine/strong, there’s a subconscious level of tilt and distraction that can set in from a dropped game that could reap destruction on any progress I hoped to make for the day.

The whole focus of this outlet is to win more than I lose, and to always manage my mental with my physical exhaustion. I never want to push myself too hard for extended sessions since a small focused set is going to lead to more overall improvement than a longer grind session.

4. Utilize Third Party Apps like OP.GG, Porofessor, Mobalytics, and U.GG

This is a point that often goes underestimated in the eyes of players. Some believe utilizing these apps is equivalent to cheating, while others believe the information is vital. Regardless of where you stand, not using these tools to accent your climb is simply limiting yourself. And until Riot themselves alters their client to prevent this information from being pulled from their servers, I say it’s completely fair game.

Each and every one of these apps provides information on not only yourself and your performance, but as well as your team and their habits, or with U.GG, the top Rune/Item choices for a given Champion. This information is invaluable and sometimes can give you a key to victory or offer a sign if you need to dodge.

For example, when copy-pasting a team from a Draft lobby into Porofessor, you’ll find that the website will tell you the following: the Summoner’s main role, their favorite Champions, their habits with their Champions, or their recent winrates. Depending on how you feel about all of this information, you can elect to dodge or continue on with a lobby

I can’t explain how each of these apps have come in clutch for me when avoiding a player that’s on a loss streak or one who is off-role to something they show no history with. Their insight is invaluable to one looking to maximize their efforts.


5. Have Fun and Be Uplifting

Before I leave you all with the solid information above, I wanted to throw in a sappy/feel-good style tip to round things out.

One of the best ways to lose LP is to be toxic. It’s to step on the guy that’s had a bad lane by flaming him. It’s to beat the guy down who’s playing a Champion you dislike for arbitrary reasons. It's to ‘soft-int’ so you ‘get out’ faster. It’s these things that limit you and your potential. They foster a mindset of negativity and entitlement that have no place for people genuinely trying to improve and achieve.

So, be uplifting. Reward good plays with recognition, encourage your teammates after missteps in-game, honor outstanding will and patience, and be a voice of positivity. Be a leader when you need one. Be a voice that calms the storm if your team is falling apart. Be a focused and fun presence and you’ll find far more victories come your way!